MEDIA-I: Yahoo rides out to woo new users

TAIPEI: Yahoo!Kimo has launched a six-week campaign to brand the integrated site as well as encourage first-time users to venture onto the web. It is the first major brand campaign by a portal in Taiwan this year and follows Yahoo's acquisition of the local portal Kimo in a US$126 million deal a year ago. Bus imagery is used extensively in the television, print and below-the-line campaign created by the client and D'Arcy. The portal wants everyone to get on the bus - its metaphor for the internet - in line with one of the campaign's objectives of encouraging first-time users to try the web. In the creative, the portal is a bus and users appear at its windows, each enjoying a particular service. Two popular features - email and search - were singled out and demystified. In both television and print executions, a mean-looking gangster proudly proclaims: "I sent an e-mail". In other creative executions, a group of uniformed policewomen coo with delight as they 'search' for a famed cartoon character's website. Four promotions will be rolled out as part of the campaign, including online and offline events. The portal will also have a bus driving around Taipei over the next three months. The bus has 10 ADSL-equipped computers, and people will be encouraged to board the bus to surf the web. "This bus will show them that the internet can be part of their life," said Yahoo!Kimo marketing director Charlene Hung. The campaign's second goal is integration. Hung said: "Both companies have strong brand equity in Taiwan, but we couldn't keep all the elements of their logos." Based on focus group findings, it was decided that the English name Yahoo would be combined with Kimo's Chinese characters. Hung said Yahoo!Kimo was now a single site, but users could access it from either address.

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